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Curia Regis Rolls
(1196-1201)The Curia Regis, king's court, of mediaeval England took cases from throughout the country, and its records are among the most important surviving from this early period.

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Northumberland Assize Rolls for the General Eyre
(1256-1279)The royal justices made periodic general eyres through all the shires of England, hearing civil and criminal cases that had accrued from the lower courts. Here we have the assize rolls of three Northumberland eyres, 24 April to 7 May 1256; 25 June to 15 July 1269; and 20 January to 9 February 1279. The bulk of the text relates to civil pleas from the county of Northumberland and the town of Newcastle upon Tyne; finishing with abstracts of the pedes finium, or feet of fines (lawsuits or pretended lawsuits establishing the ownership of land) arising at the three eyres. But there are also criminal cases (as in the scan here), lists of bailiffs, &c.

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Clergy, the religious and the faithful in Britain and Ireland
(1305-1342)These are abstracts of the entries relating to Great Britain and Ireland from the Regesta of popes Clement V, John XXII and Benedict XII. Many of these entries relate to clerical appointments and disputes, but there are also indults to devout laymen and women for portable altars, remission of sins, &c. This source is particularly valuable for Ireland, for which many of the key government records of this period are lost. Clement V was consecrated and crowned 14 November 1305 (the day from which his pontificate is dated); John XXII was crowned 5 September 1316; Benedict XII 8 January 1335 and died 25 April 1342. From 1309 onwards the papacy was in exile at Avignon. The extracts were made by W. H. Bliss from Regesta lii to cxxxvi, and published in 1895. Bliss remarked that 'although the writing of the Papal Registers of the 14th century is clearer than that of many contemporary English MSS., the entries in them were for the most part founded upon petitions or letters from different countries, and the scribes in the Papal Chancery must have experienced even greater difficulty in copying English proper names than English students experience nowadays in reading the early Chancery Rolls preserved in the Public Record Office. Not having local or personal knowledge, they constantly misread doubtful letters.'

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Clergy, the religious and the faithful in Britain and Ireland
(1342-1362)These are abstracts of the entries relating to Great Britain and Ireland from the Regesta of popes Clement VI and Innocent VI, from the period when the papal court was resident at Avignon. Many of these entries relate to clerical appointments and disputes, but there are also indults to devout laymen and women for portable altars, remission of sins, &c. This source is particularly valuable for Ireland, for which many of the key government records of this period are lost. Clement VI was consecrated and crowned 19 May 1342 (the day from which his pontificate is dated); Innocent VI was crowned 18 December 1352 and died 12 September 1362. The extracts were made by W. H. Bliss and C. Johnson from Regesta cxxxvii to ccxliv, and published in 1897. The registers are almost complete for these two pontificates. At his accession, Clement VI promised to grant benefices to all poor clerks who should come to Avignon and claim them within two months of his coronation. As many as 100,000 are said to have come, and the register for the first year of his pontificate runs to twelve volumes.

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Inhabitants of Yorkshire: Harthill wapentake
(1380)The poll tax returns for this wapentake, the area around Market Weighton, Pocklington and South Cave.

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Douglas family charters
(1150-1400)The register of the more ancient writs of the Douglases of Dalkeith, Midlothian, Earls of Morton is probably the oldest chartulary of lay possessions in Scotland, and contains about 300 charters. It was edited by C. Innes and published by the Bannatyne Club in 1853 as part II of the Registrum Honoris de Morton. The names that occur are principally those of grantors, grantees and witnesses, mostly from Midlothian.

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Clergy, the religious and the faithful in Britain and Ireland
(1362-1404)These are abstracts of the entries relating to Great Britain and Ireland from the Regesta of popes Urban V, Gregory XI, (Anti-Pope) Clement VII, Urban VI and Boniface IX, and the Lateran Regesta of Boniface IX. Many of these entries relate to clerical appointments and disputes, but there are also indults to devout laymen and women for portable altars, remission of sins, &c. This source is particularly valuable for Ireland, for which many of the key government records of this period are lost. Urban V was consecrated and crowned 6 November 1362 (the day from which his pontificate is dated); Gregory XI was crowned 5 January 1371; Clement VII 31 October 1378; Urban VI 18 April 1378; Boniface IX 9 November 1389 and died 1 October 1404. Until 1376 the papacy was in exile at Avignon. The extracts were made by W. H. Bliss from Regesta ccxlv to cccxx and Lateran Regesta i to xliii, and published in 1902. Bliss remarked that 'although the writing of the Papal Registers of the 14th century is clearer than that of many contemporary English MSS., the entries in them were for the most part founded upon petitions or letters from different countries, and the scribes in the Papal Chancery must have experienced even greater difficulty in copying English proper names than English students experience nowadays in reading the early Chancery Rolls preserved in the Public Record Office. Not having local or personal knowledge, they constantly misread doubtful letters.'

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Clergy, the religious and the faithful in Britain and Ireland
(1471-1484)These are abstracts of the entries relating to Great Britain and Ireland from the Lateran and Vatican Regesta of pope Sixtus IV. Many of these entries relate to clerical appointments and disputes, but there are also indults to devout laymen and women for portable altars, remission of sins, &c. This source is particularly valuable for Ireland, for which many of the key government records of this period are lost. Many of the names in the text were clearly a puzzle to the scribes in Rome, and spelling of British and Irish placenames and surnames is chaotic. Sixtus IV was consecrated and crowned 25 August 1471 (the day from which his pontificate is dated) and died at Rome 12 August 1484. The extracts were made by J. A. Twemlow from Vatican Regesta dxlvi to dclxxxi and Lateran Regesta dccxiii to dcccxxxviii, and published in 1955. Not all the Lateran registers survive from this pontificate, but were still in existence in the 18th century, when indexes were compiled giving rubricelle, or brief summaries of the papal bulls; nor, indeed, have all these indexes now survived, but Twemlow added an appendix listing all the rubricelle relating to the British Isles extant for the reign of Sixtus IV.

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Clergy, the religious and the faithful in Britain and Ireland
(1484-1492)These are abstracts of the entries relating to Great Britain and Ireland from the Lateran and Vatican Regesta of pope Innocent VIII. Many of these entries relate to clerical appointments and disputes, but there are also indults to devout laymen and women for portable altars, remission of sins, &c. This source is particularly valuable for Ireland, for which most of the key government and ecclesiastical records of this period are lost. Innocent VIII was consecrated and crowned 12 September 1484 (the day from which his pontificate is dated) and died at Rome 25 July 1492. The extracts were made by J. A. Twemlow from Vatican Regesta dclxxxii to dcclxxi and Lateran Regesta dcccxxxviii to dcccxl.

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Officers and tenants of the Scottish crown
(1488-1496)In 1887 the 10th volume of Rotuli Scaccarii Regum Scotorum, or The Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, was published in Edinburgh as part of the Scottish Series of Chronicles and Memorials. The main text is a transcript in extended Latin, but with some passages reduced to an abstract in English (in italics), of the rolls of the Scottish royal exchequer from 19 June 1488 to 12 October 1496 (rolls cclxxviii to ccxcv, old numbers ccxciii to cccix). This more or less continuous series alternates between accounts of the Ballivi ad Extra (royal chamberlains, lessees of lordships, rangers of wards, receivers &c) and those of the Custumars (receivers of customary payments and similar revenues) and bailies (bailiffs) of burghs (boroughs). In all, they give a summary description of all these sources of royal revenue - and not only mention the payers and receivers in general, but also refer to many occasional payments to and receipts from individuals hardly otherwise found in the surviving records. An appendix (pages 629 to 763) of rentals of royal property throughout Scotland in the same period gives a rich harvest of personal names; and another (764-772), an Index in Libros Responsionum, lists persons to whom sasine (seisin) was granted in 1492 to 1496.